Our Alumni
AIG PUBLIC LEADERS PROGRAMME ALUMNI IMPACT STORY
Idowu Bakare is an Assistant Director in the Directorate of Interparliamentary Relations at the National Assembly; this is the section of the National Assembly that manages relations between the National Assembly and other national parliaments and Interparliamentary organisations.
Idowu joined the inaugural class of the AIG Public Leaders Programme because he wanted to advance his competency levels and elevate his ability to solve public administration challenges. He states that the programme exceeded his expectations.
“The AIG Public Leaders Programme has propelled me to managerial levels that I could only have dreamed of. Understanding and dealing with cognitive biases in the workplace is one area that has helped me a lot. Also, being taught about passive and active waste in public administration has enabled me to teach such lessons and ideals in my place of work. Typical of top-level education, the opportunity to learn from other course mates gave me a chance to learn from peers about other ways to address similar challenges”.
PLP candidates carry out a capstone project in their organisations, using learnings they have gained from the programme. Idowu’s project was titled “Reducing Paperwork and Public Engagement in the National Assembly with the use of ICT’’ and he is implementing a digital cloud-based platform called “House Dashboard” where legislative and administrative resources will be received, uploaded, shared and utilised in a fast and secure manner.
He says he conceived the idea for this project because the legislative processes at the National Assembly are manual, paper-based and slow, which makes it difficult for members of the public to access information, causes delays in passing legislation and affects the free flow of information across the National Assembly. Eventually, bills and other legislative proposals will be run on the dashboard and enable real-time citizen access to legislative resources.
The programme gave Idowu insight on the importance of understanding how every member of a team works, this insight has helped him harness their skills to effectively produce the different results the team would require.
“The AIG Public Leaders Programme has transformed my work; my hitherto narrow consultation base has widened following lessons from Professors Chris Stone and Kate Orkin. I have also begun mentoring my subordinates with the skills I acquired, and their productivity and mine are increasing as a result.”